Saturday, July 3, 2010

WOW! I can't believe it is already 4th of July weekend. I only have four weeks of classes left before finals! This summer is flying by and I have been SO busy, but I'm trying to soak up every minute. In my last post I mentioned that my first test was coming up. Well, it came, and I ACED it!! Made a 98! I was very proud of myself, especially since I'm one of the few people in the class who has NEVER seen phonetics in my life!

Being a full time student, after having been a full time employee, gives me a new perspective on school. School is my job now. I am blessed enough to have a husband who is supporting me through this process, and I feel like I owe it to him, and of course to myself, to do my absolute best. Getting an A is like my boss telling me good job! Also, I know that this master's degree will probably not be the end to my education. I hope to go on to other educational endeavors after working for a while.

This past Tuesday, I had my Anatomy midterm. This class has been fascinating. We have the amazing privilege of working the cadaver lab. Learning about things in your textbook, and then seeing them on a real human body makes such a difference. Textbooks tend to make it seem like every organ, nerve and cell look the same from person to person. But when you get in the lab and get to compare the hearts of two individuals or the lungs of a smoker to those of a nonsmoker, you see the individuality that is inherent in human nature. It is a beautiful thing to see the ways that God has made our bodies to function. I feel so blessed that those individuals donated their bodies so that I could learn from them. They are, in their deaths, impacting so many people; emotionally and educationally impacting the students who learn from them, and then exponentially affecting all the patients that the students will work with throughout their careers. Even though you can't hear me, thank you for allowing me to explore and learn from you.

So back to my midterm, I studied for probably 60 hrs for this test. It covered all of the basic anatomy terms, the entire nervous system, aging and development, the respiratory system, and the anatomy and physiology of the ear. whew! I felt pretty prepared going into the test, until i got to about the 5th question. This was definitely one of the hardest tests I've ever taken! The whole class was worried about our grades, and I for one, spent the next 2 days depressed thinking I had probably made a C. Well, I went to my professor's office to get my grade.... and I made an A!!! I was ELATED! Now it was no 98, it was barely an A, but it was an A! All my studying did pay off, and now I have better direction as to how to study for the final!

We also recently got to hear a lecture from Dr. Ghali, an oral maxillofacial surgeon here in Shreveport. His lecture was focused on cleft palate repair surgeries. A few of the kiddos I worked with in Early Steps had cleft palates, and they were a big reason I chose to study Speech-Language Pathology, so I LOVED this lecture. Seeing the before and after pictures and videos from during surgeries was amazing. I have never in my life wanted to be a doctor, but Dr. Ghali made me want to be a surgeon. I will be sticking to SLP for now, but now med school is a tiny twinkle in my brain.

Now, I'm off to spend my saturday working on a paper on vocal fold hydration (which is absolutely fascinating, by the way) and then hopefully spending the evening relaxing with my hubby! I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend!!